Computing and network technologies have transformed many aspects of everyday life. Networking technologies like the Internet provide individuals virtually unlimited access to remote systems, information and associated applications. As computing and network technologies have evolved and have become more robust, secure and reliable, more consumers, wholesalers, retailers, service providers, entrepreneurs, educational institutions and the like are shifting paradigms and are employing the Internet to perform business in addition to traditional means. For example, merchants can use online advertisements to sell or promote their products either through their own web sites, e-mail or other electronic message advertising, and/or advertisements that can appear on web sites, blogs, etc. of third parties.
Conventionally, merchants have also relied on other forms of advertisement, including word-of-mouth advertising, to promote their products. For example, a purchaser of a product may tell family, friends, or others, with whom the purchaser may have influence, about the product, and/or may give them an advertisement or coupon related to the product. Some of those family members, friends, or others may purchase the product based on such a referral by the purchaser.
With the advent of the Internet, word-of-mouth advertising has entered cyberspace. Conventional word-of-mouth advertising systems typically reward a user based on the number of people to whom he/she refers the advertisement who then perform an action defined by the advertiser. For example, a user may e-mail an advertisement or coupon for a game to a friend. If his/her friend performs the desired action (e.g., purchase) then the user can receive some reward from the advertiser (e.g., product discount, loyalty rewards) because the referral was successful.
One problem with such an approach to rewards is that it looks only at the number of successful referrals a user has generated. This approach inherently promotes users to send out a large number of referrals, even referrals to persons that may have little interest in the advertised product, in the hope that a small percentage of these referrals will be successful. Consequently, such an approach can encourage spamming scenarios and can also lead to uncontrolled brand discrediting. For example, if a user sends out a large number of untargeted referral advertisements for a product, the untargeted referrals can in turn lead to negative sentiment toward the product.
It is desirable to encourage word-of-mouth advertising by users to take advantage of the influence a user may have over friends, family, and others who have an interest in the opinions of the user. It is further desirable to discourage untargeted referrals and spamming with regard to the product or service being advertised, as such approaches can be counterproductive to promoting the product or service.